


The Emperor's Shield

by pipistrelle



Series: Armed and Armored [3]
Category: The Goblin Emperor - Katherine Addison
Genre: Csethiro Learning To Be Empress, F/M, Family, Fluff, M/M, Maia Getting To Be Happy, Multi, Nonmonogamy, Relationship Negotiation, Slice Of Royal Life, Very Light Csevet/Maia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-29
Updated: 2020-06-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:26:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24971527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pipistrelle/pseuds/pipistrelle
Summary: Csethiro explores her love for Maia and her place in the Imperial family -- which leads her to explore Csevet's, too.
Relationships: Csethiro Ceredin/Maia Drazhar, Csevet Aisava & Csethiro Ceredin
Series: Armed and Armored [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1807447
Comments: 8
Kudos: 73





	The Emperor's Shield

**Author's Note:**

> My aim with all fanfic can best be encapsulated in Virginia Woolf's, "It was one of those unclassified affections, of which there are so many."

There were thirty-seven bedchambers in the Alcethmeret, each with its own inconveniences and advantages. The one designated for the Emperor’s use was of course the grandest; it was also the draftiest, and the most cluttered up with the sentimental and storied relics of past Emperors. 

“Needst not keep _all_ these tapestries,” Csethiro muttered, eyeing one of Edretnevar III’s ascension to the priesthood of Ulis under the eye of his distant god, rendered for the occasion as a great white peacock in the sky.

“I shall have them all burned, an they do not please thee,” Maia said happily. It was a rare morning, that they had been allowed to lie abed until the great eastern windows caught the light. Emperors of the Elflands might be cruel or ignorant, as they chose, but they were not permitted to be layabouts. 

Maia turned towards her, the brilliant dawnlight aglow on his face, so much warmer and more alive than the statue of him which was already taking shape in the grand Gallery. As though to prove it to herself, and because she could, she kissed him. The rapturous delight she caused with such a simple act was a greater power than she had ever envisioned, even as Empress. 

A polite cough announced Beshelar, who of course had never left, but was so skilled in discretion that they both remembered his presence only at that moment. Both subsided, Maia abashed, Csethiro thoughtful. “Deepest apologies, Serenity,” Beshelar said, “but Mer Aisava requests your attendance in the Tortoise Room at your earliest opportunity.”

The dread and distaste on Maia’s face, so far from his usual mask of Imperial impassivity, pricked Csethiro to pull him into her arms again, in defiance of Beshelar and the world. But it was not merely the world she contended against; Edrehasivar emerged like a moth from the cocoon of Maia’s joy to oppose her as well. He disentangled himself from her and from the bedclothes. “We must leave you,” he said, almost thoughtlessly slipping into the formal as his mind ranged ahead to the problems of the day. 

Csethiro caught at the sleeve of his dressing gown. “Say first -- hast not quarrelled with Csevet?”

Maia looked aghast. “Quarrel with Csevet? The Ethuveraz would fall. How couldst thou think it?”

Csethiro quirked an eyebrow. “Thou didst look like a child biting a lemon when his name was mentioned.”

Edrehasivar retreated; Maia laughed. “I had forgot thou wert watching. Forgive me -- an Emperor shouldst not pull faces like an unruly child. It’s only that I would wish to stay here with thee a little longer. And…” he hesitated, then with the air of one who knows he might be embarrassing himself and has decided not to care, continued, “Hast ever seen the Istandaärtha?”

“Once,” Csethiro said. “From the air. My mother had fallen ill and my father took us all west, to take the waters. I wast but a child.”

“I never have,” he confessed. “Is’t not ridiculous? But I have read of it in books. The endless torrent that cannot be stopped or steered. And Csevet -- could there be such a thing, I sometimes think Csevet would be as a dam across it.” Seeing Csethiro’s puzzled look, he smiled, drew in the air a straight line and behind it wiggled his fingers; a rushing torrent. “Behind Csevet comes the flood, you see. Only instead of water, it is letters.”

Csethiro snorted. “And art called the Bridge-Builder for nothing? To thy duties, Edrehasivar. I will dine with thee tonight, an thou dost not drown in thy correspondence.”

* * *

“Well, niece,” Aunt Arbelan said over breakfast in one of the minor receiving rooms. “How do you like it -- being Empress?”

It was an innocent question, yet there was irony in it; Aunt Arbelan was smiling, but her hands resting on the table beside her teacup had the relaxed tension of weapons in readiness, her wrists thin as rapier blades. 

The question deserved due consideration. Csethiro took a sip of her tea, which had been made precisely as strong and tart as she liked, and replaced it on the saucer from a tea service more ancient than half her family’s holdings. “We like it well enough, though we are new to it. We would of course be grateful beyond measure for any guidance you might be able to offer us. We wish to serve our husband and the Ethuveraz in every way that lies within our power.”

Aunt Arbelan’s smile was very mild, but in it Csethiro thought she detected a hint of approving irony. “You have come to it in a time of great change -- a change not just of ruler, nor dynasty, but of things more fundamental even than that. And though you are young, we trust you understand that change can be dangerous. ‘ _An emperor is guarded by steel, sorcery, and protocol, but it is by love and wisdom that he is made secure_ ’.”

“We also have read the _Interregnum_ ,” Csethrio said sharply, but even as it left her lips she regretted the harshness of her tone. Aunt Arbelan had not intended to recite her her earliest lessons as a rebuke to her education. A second too late, Csethiro recognized precisely the attitude of Therris, her first sword-teacher, as he used to step easily into the practice ring and lay into her with an insolent, beautiful blow -- one that said _Remember how much you have to learn, and remember that I have learned it before you were in leading-strings. I will not let you fall below your best._

This thing, this work of being Empress, could kill her. It had killed four of Verenechibel’s wives, and turned Csoru from bad to worse. Sheer arrogance to believe she was above its corruption, immune to its dangers, merely because her own will was strong and her husband’s ideas were naive. Was that not precisely where the greatest danger lay?

She felt a ferocious pang of respect for the woman across the table, and an equally fierce pang of anger and regret at not having known her sooner. “Though perhaps we have not read it as recently as we ought. We thank you, Aunt, for the reminder.”

With the light hand of the accustomed diplomat Aunt Arbelan forgave the slight. “We, too, are glad of the opportunity to again be of service. What Corulis did not write in the _Interregnum_ is that an emperor is guarded as well by his Empress’ powers of perception; you will see much that your lord does not. We heard an interesting tale just a se’ennight past from Dach’osmerrem Marudaran. We believe it concerned a fire in the Marudada holdings in Thu-Cethel...”

Lord Berenar, too, had heard that interesting story. When Csethiro cautiously mentioned it to him in the course of a working dinner in the Alcethmeret, he seemed both relieved that she was aware of it and distressed that it had reached her. “A low and dishonorable scheme,” he said, in an aggrieved tone that would have been a grumble in a less forthright man. “The holder of the lands takes payment in advance for his shipments, then by accident they are destroyed -- not his fault, he is of course blameless and above accusation. Perhaps those who paid him seek redress in the law courts, but such an undertaking is timely and expensive. Perhaps he generously returns a portion of the fees -- but walks away the richer nonetheless. And perhaps it is later discovered that the storehouses that burned held nothing but chaff and broken equipment --”

“Perhaps Lord Berenar envisions more corruption than there is in this case,” Maia said gently, but he was frowning. “Nothing has yet been proven.”

Lord Berenar inclined his head in deference to his sovereign’s optimistic sensibilities. “If we do, Serenity, it is from long experience, rather than a wish to see such fears borne out.”

“Indeed.” Maia’s ears showed that he was pained, and angry, and striving to keep control of both emotions. “Csevet, the investigation --”

“We have taken charge of it ourself, Serenity,” Csevet replied promptly. “We shall present all we find to the Lord Chancellor’s office.” And no more of it was said at table.

A great deal more of it was said publicly, a week or two later, when the scandal in all its lurid detail was suddenly everywhere in court. The Marudada were disgraced, their small holders compensated from the Imperial purse. “Now we must beware their resentment,” Lord Berenar warned Edrehasivar, several times in Csethiro’s hearing. She had minded her aunt’s lesson, that she might see what others did not. She made careful inquiries. The Marudada were indeed resentful, and spiteful as well; it was clear in every comment, every mode of dress chosen by Dach’osmerrem Marudaran and Dach’osmin Marudin, who were the only members of the family left at court. Csethiro felt they were certain to try some action to undermine Edrehasivar, who had embarrassed them so cruelly.

Yet no action manifested. Csethiro inquired yet more deeply and more subtly, found the majority of her inquires rebuffed. The rest brought her news of odd occurrences -- unexpected storms that rerouted airships or washed out roads, innkeepers’ reports of lamed horses belonging to Imperial servants that miraculalously recovered after a few nights of rest. Insignificant events, perhaps. But Csethiro, raised in the heart of the Ethuveraz and student of history’s greatest tacticians, knew the importance of broken connections. And that couriers were notoriously clannish. 

_An emperor is guarded by steel, sorcery, protocol, his Empress’ powers of perception, and his secretary’s confidentiality with couriers_ , she thought. She did not interfere; the entire affair had been an object lesson for her on the fragile underpinnings of her husband’s power.

But it was not in her nature to be retiring where boldness could serve. So one clear autumn morning she took her tea out on one of the Alcethmeret’s sheltered terraces, while Maia and Csevet worked. In reponse to some commonplace remark about the weather she said mildly, “Indeed, the city is fortunate. We understand the climate has been much less favorable in Thu-Cethel these months. Particularly for travelers.”

The searching flicker of Csevet's eyes was enough; he understood. He did not otherwise react to this reference to the treasonous conspiracy he had strangled in its crib. Perhaps, Csethiro found herself thinking, the underpinnings of her husband’s power were not so fragile as she had assumed. 

“Is’t so? We must allocate funds for repairs of the roads, then,” said Maia, who was by no means guileless, but -- in fact the opposite -- was perhaps content to let those closest to him keep whatever secret meanings and conferences they thought best. 

* * *

Life in the Alcethmeret was not all politics. The politics, indeed, came easier to Csethiro than the rest. But she adjusted to her life as Empress as she did everything; with intention and determination, and a passion that she usually went to great lengths to keep hidden from men, since they seemed to find it either laughable or terrifying. Maia never laughed at her, and though he often seemed nervous around her at first, he never seemed terrified of her. Csethiro found herself deeply grateful for that, and thought often of Nevis Chavar’s insipid party where she had first spoken truly to her future husband, and what she had said to him then and surprised herself by meaning it: _We do not wish you to be frightened of us_.

Maia treated her, those first hectic few months, with the respect due to a fellow ruler and with a kindness so genuine that it seemed almost absurd. The nights they spent together were honest and tender, and quite awkward at first, as Csethiro (always a quick study) tried to hold herself back from devouring him, and he tried to learn her as thoroughly as possible, to understand every startling development and wondrous discovery as though no such thing could ever have existed even in man’s imagination before. They got on quite well. 

Sometimes, at odd quiet moments, Csethiro caught Maia looking at her and saw something in his face, a sort of glow, and felt that it came not from him but from her -- that he saw a light in her, a quick fire, and sometimes reflected it back to her. It was one of the most beautiful things she’d ever seen.

“I understand thee perfectly,” Vedero told her, over metheglin and a low hearth-fire in one of the first cold, clear nights of winter.

Csethiro was warm, flushed, exultant. “I knew thou wouldst! Tis thine own words I thought of -- of the moon, whose cold fire comes not from itself. And Csevet -- that is, Mer Aisava --”

Vedero was puzzled by this sudden turn from the romantic to the prosaic. “His Serenity’s secretary?”

“Csevet is the moon,” Csethiro continued, unabashed. “His Serenity is -- is like our own sphere, that holds our cities and bridges, and our lives, and the sun --”

“Hast reversed the metaphor,” Vedero chided her, but Csethiro took no notice. She was alight with understanding and the dizzying confidence of excellent fiery metheglin. The Alcethmeret was its own tiny dance of planets, a well-ordered house. She, Csethiro, warmed the Emperor with her fierce fire, like the sun; and Csevet, like the moon, ruled and ordered their days, marked time, appeared cool and impassive in the Alcethmeret each morning, more punctual than the clocks. Maia may have cared deeply for Csethiro -- might even, some day, love her -- but he leaned on Csevet, trusted him with the same unthinking confidence as he trusted the ground beneath his feet to bear him up, trusted his own hand to move at his will’s direction. It was a thing Csethiro, who had grown up in court, had hardly ever seen, and it was a beautiful sight. 

This she endeavored to explain, with more enthusiasm than sense, to Vedero, who listened to her with the cool intellect that not even metheglin could soften, straining what sense she could from the torrent of words. “Csethiro,” she said at last, “art in love with thy husband’s secretary?”

Taking in Csethiro’s shocked silence, she added, “I do not intend to shame thee. Indeed, there is little shame in it -- Empresses have been unfaithful for as long as history, and many with malice in mind, which thou hast none of. Only tell me the truth.”

This was their highest stricture of honor, the most sacred charge possible between them, the promise that they had since girlhood pledged each other never to break. Above all, the truth. So Csethiro thought hard, her faculties swimming through the haze of drunkenness, valiant as sailors in a storm-tossed sea struggling towards the hidden cove where their ship’s sunken treasure lay. She had been Empress for half a year, and in all that time had never allowed herself the freedom nor the relaxation of letting her guard down, of speaking candidly with a friend. She had perhaps over-indulged. She would not do so again.

“I am not -- I shall never be unfaithful to His Serenity,” she said, rather stiffly, for she felt this more strongly than she could easily express. “His honor is dearer to me than mine own. I -- treasure his esteem. And his kindness.”

“He is a good man,” Vedero said gently. “I meant not to accuse thee --”

“No. No. Thou’rt -- do not apologize. There is -- a closeness. An affection. I am not _in love_ with Mer Aisava. I think, if we had been on the plains at the Silver Fortress, when the goblin armies came…”

“Fellows in a common cause,” Vedero supplied. It occurred to Csethiro, with a sense of great injustice, that Vedero was nearly sober. “I understand thee well. But before thou’rt lost in talk of battles --”

“As if thou dost not prattle on about stars,” Csethiro interjected, and was ignored.

“I _must_ ask -- and ask thee to tell me true, remembering that I care also for my brother’s health and long rule -- is _Maia_ in love with him?”

“That depends,” Csethiro said slowly, aware now of treading the edge of some great abyss -- or not an abyss, but a blankness, as on a map of uncharted lands, “on what is meant by ‘love’.”

“Thou wert always miserable at rhetoric,” Vedero said, with all the fondness of their years of friendship. “Would thou hadst been born a barbarian and couldst solve all thy problems with fists. In what meaning, then, does my brother love his secretary?”

“In the manner I have told thee -- of the moon, and the earth,” Csethiro said, and tried to be indignant at being doubted, but found she was not equal to it. The weariness of metheglin was stealing over her now, and to Vedero’s equal amusement and disappointment, she was good for no more conversation that night.

* * *

Was Maia in love with Csevet?

Csethiro was sure they did not share a bed. She was certain their relationship had been strictly conventional at the time of her wedding, and she was equally certain she would have detected a change in Maia if anything so momentous had occurred in the intervening months. His inexperienced awkwardness, his bewilderment, his breathless delight at her body and its ways had altered not one whit since their marriage. And while Csevet was certainly a master at protocol and discretion, not even he could have kept such an arrangement secret from the Empress once she was looking for it. 

She did look for it, and did not find it, and found that she did not know how she felt. On the one hand she was certainly jealous -- on the other hand Maia, who was also Edrehasivar, seemed at times such a great and multifaceted soul that she already shared with the entire Ethuveraz. On one hand she would have been crushed, moreso than she could even dimly comprehend, to find that Maia had broken faith with her. On the other hand -- or perhaps the same hand -- she was sure he could not, any more than he could leap from the roof of the Alcethmeret and fly. He would suffer agonies to hide such a thing from her; and he was not in agony. He was, she believed, cautiously daring to be happy.

And Csevet was never less than proper in anything. Although his propriety would be increased by such a scandalous secret, rather than the reverse. _He_ might well be in agony, and Csethiro would have no way of telling, for he was always warmly courteous and deferential to her, and never intimate or chiding or sarcastic as he sometimes dared to be with Maia. And Maia was devastatingly easy to love.

And could she, in the end, deny Maia anything he wanted, since he wanted so little? Vedero was right; the infidelities of the Imperial family, recorded and rumored, could (and perhaps did) fill an entire library. Surely Maia would not be the first Emperor to have a liason with one of his household staff, and he would certainly be kinder and more considerate about it than most. Csethiro would of course bear his children -- if he were to come to her, as he undoubtedly would feel he must, and ask her, could he seek pleasure in another bed…? 

She found herself thinking, wry and self-chiding, that she should have considered this as part and parcel of ascending to the throne. She joked with herself that she might even one day dare to ask Aunt Arbelan for advice. 

The question did not arise. There was always work to be done, in the ever-turning ceremonial processions of days, weeks, moons, festivals, trials, feasts, famines, investigations and decrees -- and in between them all the evenings and afternoons to be got through, luncheons and teas, muted conversations over breakfast and, infrequent but delightful, nights that Maia and Csethiro had to themselves, for each other. And through it all Csevet, present even when he was absent, shaping the course of their lives, marking time, asking nothing. Only -- Csethiro was more and more sure -- waiting for something to be given for which he could not ask. 

* * *

Csethiro, like all courtiers who were not complete idiots, had a subtle and profound intuition for the movements of people and information within the Untheileneise Court. Csoru used to compare it to the sensitivity of a spider in the center of its clever web, but that was only to give her a bloated sense of her own power. Csethiro thought of it more as the skill of a general, receiving fragmented and disparate reports from haggard scouts in the midst of a battle and forming in her mind a picture of the complicated whole. 

So she knew, within a half hour of the ropes being slung around the mooring post, that the airship _Devotion of Oskarro_ had docked -- an hour behind schedule because of the unfavorable trade winds, but with no serious mishap. She executed a calm and skillful rearguard action to extricate herself from a diplomatic dinner and returned to the Alcethmeret with haste that fell just short of unseemly. 

The grilles were shut against the Court and the world, but not the Empress. The Tortoise and Rose rooms were empty. In the main dining hall she found Csevet, sitting with shoulders hunched and ears despondent over a cup of delicately steaming tea. He leapt up and bowed at her approach, then at her nod resumed his seat with a straighter back. “His Serenity has gone to bed,” he said, in a voice that was itself a record of a battle hard fought and hard won. 

She studied him. She had learned in the first week of her marriage that Csevet’s condition could tell her much about Maia’s, and Csevet’s condition was miserable. He was undone as he seldom allowed himself to be, with his ornate court jacket hanging loose and his hair disarranged from travel. Csethiro herself had traveled by airship only a handful of times, but remembered the bone-chilling winds that scraped the high mooring stations even on balmy summer days. It was hardly a month to Winternight; the sky outside the tower windows was blustery and foul. 

There were shadows under Csevet’s eyes. Csethiro took the chair beside him. “Was it very bad?”

“No,” Csevet said after a moment’s thought. “Not so bad as it might have been. The workers’ families were very grateful to His Serenity, for coming himself. And he bore it well enough. The worst of it was when the prelate asked him to join in beseeching Uleris’ blessing. His Serenity went up with him -- onto the bridge --” Csevet’s hand twitched out to one side. The gesture mimicked the lifting of heavy royal robes so their wearer could clamber up onto a half-laid grate of wood and steel, all that yet existed of Edrehasivar’s great Wisdom Bridge. 

“He climbed onto the bridge from which five workers fell to their deaths.” It was not a question; she would not have doubted for a moment that Maia would do such a thing, if it had occurred to her that he might. She told herself severely that it _should_ have occurred to her. 

“The rest of the workers felt the Emperor’s blessing would grant them safety. They are superstitious men, Highness. Of course His Serenity could not refuse, but -- he was not dressed for the wind. And it was very cold.”

Csethiro had not yet seen the growing foundations of the Wisdom Bridge, but the scale model of it was displayed in pride of place in the Tortoise Room, and she could imagine the real thing vividly. The huge square bulks of the towers just beginning to rise, mere hills and not yet tangrishi-headed mountains; the first struts of the bridge itself, a bare skeleton, pistons and ribs of iron; the river raging beneath, impossibly wild, wind-lashed, untameable; and out on the furthest spar two thin figures, a black-robed prelate and the black-clad Emperor of the Elflands, jet and garnet in his hair, skin slate-gray against a storm-gray sky. 

“We wish we could have accompanied you,” she said.

Csevet shook his head. “It would not have done, Your Highness, if you will forgive us for saying so. The risk was too great.” Even two years into the reign of Edrehasivar VII, no one was comfortable with the idea of the entire Imperial family aboard the same airship, and there had been need of haste.

The spectre of a crashed Imperial airship led, as inevitable as blasted metal plummeting from the sky, to the thought: perhaps it had happened again. The official report blamed the deaths of five bridge workmen on a flaw in the iron they stood on, that had caused a spar to snap and sent them plunging into the river. But reports could be faked. A few well-placed devices like the one that had slain Maia’s father would cripple the Wisdom Bridge -- probably not permanently, but long enough that it became too costly in lives and coin to complete. And then the craven landed families of the East could crow, _I_ _t was a cloud-dream from the first, as we told you!_

The lords who would benefit by such sabotage did not even need to bring it about themselves; they needed only approve of it once it was done. 

Knowing Csevet shared her thoughts, she said, “There will be an investigation, of course.”

She was startled by the fierceness of Csevet’s reply. “We spoke to the Witness for the Dead, and to the foremen. It was an accident. We are _certain_ it was an accident. We have had chapters of the Vigilant Brotherhood standing guard since ground was broken on the first tower, and all are completely loyal. We designed the safety protocols for the workers ourself, and all the guilds we have contacted assure us that they are as thorough as they could possibly be. If there was a flaw in the iron, we shall find out why. But the wind --”

“Csevet.” It was half a rebuke, though she tried to keep her tone gentle. “We inquired merely for information. We did not mean to cast doubt on your competence.” After a moment she added, “Only a fool would question that, and we flatter ourself that we are not so foolish.”

Csevet recalled himself. His shoulders slumped again, nearly imperceptibly, but Csethiro marked the movement. “No, Your Highness. We know it. We are -- somewhat overwrought, and we must beg your pardon.”

“You must do no such thing.” His outburst had made some things clearer. “You designed the safety protocols yourself?”

“Not alone, you understand, Your Highness. We know next to nothing about the construction of bridges. But we learned what was needful in order to design them. We… we do not mean to disparage the guild leaders, but we dared not trust the task to anyone else.”

Csethiro touched his wrist where it rested on the table beside his cup. He blinked at her, startled out of self-recrimination. She said, “You wished to spare the emperor this grief.”

He smiled, wan and helpless. “There are many griefs we wish to spare His Serenity. It is our job. This one…” he sighed and took a sip of his tea. Csethiro saw in the gesture a remnant of the courier downing a stiff shot of something fiery on a bitter night. “It is his legacy. We will not let it become a graveyard. Or a laughingstock.”

The Folly Bridge, it was being called in satires. The satires did not bother Maia at all; unlike every Emperor before him, he had a sense of humor strong enough to withstand them. But the men killed by the snapped spar were a different matter. The bridge was the only thing that had yet been built under Edrehasivar’s sole orders and for no other reason. The men who had died would have been in no danger, if Edrehasivar had not taken the throne; that was how he thought of it. Csethiro had been with him when the news of the deaths came, and knew how deeply he felt them.

“We will not let it go wrong again,” Csevet declared. Then, with a secretary’s precision and his own scrupulous honesty, he corrected himself: “We will do all that is in our power to prevent it.”

Csethiro squeezed his shoulder. As he looked up at her his eyes were red, but he lifted his chin and set his ears at an angle of determination. 

“Men call me the Emperor’s Blade,” she told him, “but thou art his shield, Csevet. I thank thee.”

A pink tinge of pride spread to the tips of his ears. He bowed his head. “It is an honor to serve, Highness.”

The decision, when the moment came to a point, was easy to make. She had ever found it so. “I have pledged my sword and all my powers to His Serenity; and after his, they are thine. If I may serve thee in any way, or may ease thy pursuit of any of thy desires,” she caught and held his gaze, though it deepened his flush, “needst only ask. Dost understand me?”

“Yes,” he said, low, seeming afraid, though she knew not of what. “We -- I understand.”

“Then see to it that thou rest thyself, for the Ethuveraz shall not stand if thou’rt not well,” she said lightly. Then, taking pity on him, she went to see to Maia, leaving him alone with his tea and his thoughts.

* * *

It was nearly another year before Csevet came to her in a brief moment between diplomatic engagements and, as perfectly formal as ever, asked her permission to have a confidential diiscussion with His Serenity regarding their relationship --

Csethiro granted it, laughing, and returned to the Alcethmeret later (much later), to her own bedchamber instead of Maia’s. But Maia was there already, as she was warned by his nohecharei stationed impassively outside the door. The Emperor of the Elflands was sitting on the edge of her bed, clad only in a diaphanous dressing gown of costly silks that he somehow made look like a robe thrown on in haste to greet a courier at the door in the middle of the night. His hair was down and his hands were bare; he came only as himself. He rose anxiously as she entered. “Csethiro. I beg pardon for the intrusion, but I must speak with thee --”

She saw at once from his look that things had gone well; anxiety clouded his face, but a faint smile was perpetually breaking through it, like the sun. “Art still not accustomed to thy throne, Edrehasivar?” she teased. “When wilt thou learn that thou must summon domestics to thine own chamber, not the other way around?”

“Thou’rt no _domestic_ ,” he said, aggrieved, and she kissed him in apology, which he accepted with all the magnanimity of his station. Breaking away he said, “I must tell thee what has passed this night --”

“Thou needst not. I know it already, in the principal points; and what I cannot guess, thou shalt keep between thyself and Csevet.”

At that a look gripped him that might have been extreme pain or extreme relief; Csethiro could not tell which, and was certain he could not tell either. Voice heavy with this unidentified emotion he said, “I love thee, Csethiro. Thou’rt my wife. My vows to thee --”

“Have not been broken by a moment of unkindness nor dishonor since the day we met,” Csethiro finished. “Thou canst have what thou wantst, Maia. Needst only ask.”

“Thou’rt a marvel,” Maia said hoarsely. “May I -- have thee, and keep thee, as I promised -- and Csevet --”

Csethiro took her own turn at magnanimity, and granted his petition; and they stayed that night not in the Emperor’s grand and drafty chamber, but in the one Csethiro had chosen as her own. It was smaller and much less sumptuously decorated but was also high in one of the spires, isolated from prying servants, and had on that account its own advantages.


End file.
